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Family Guy
Family Guy is an American adult animated sitcom created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series centers on the Griffins, a family consisting of parents Peter and Lois; their children Meg, Chris, and Stewie; and their anthropomorphic pet dog Brian. The show is set in the fictional city of Quahog, Rhode Island, and exhibits much of its humor in the form of cutaway gags that often lampoon American culture. The family was conceived by MacFarlane after developing two animated films, The Life of Larry ''and ''Larry and Steve. MacFarlane redesigned the films' protagonist, Larry, and his dog, Steve, and renamed them Peter and Brian, respectively. MacFarlane pitched a seven-minute pilot to Fox in 1998, and the show was greenlit and began production. Shortly after the third season of Family Guy ''had aired in 2002, Fox canceled the series, with one episode left unaired. Adult Swim burned off the episode in 2003, finishing the series' original run. However, favorable DVD sales and high ratings for syndicated reruns on Adult Swim convinced the network to renew the show in 2004 for a fourth season, which began airing on May 1, 2005. ''Family Guy has been nominated for 12 Primetime Emmy Awards and 11 Annie Awards, and has won three of each. In 2009, it was nominated for an Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy Series, the first time an animated series was nominated for the award since The Flintstones in 1961. Family Guy ''has also received criticism, including unfavorable comparisons to ''The Simpsons. May tie-in media have been released, including Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story, ''a straight-to-DVD special released in 2005; ''Family Guy: Live in Vegas, ''a soundtrack-DVD combo released in 2005, featuring music from the show as well as original music created by MacFarlane and Walter Murphy; a video game and pinball machine, released in 2006 and 2007, respectively; since 2005, six books published by Harper Adult based on the ''Family Guy ''universe; and ''Laugh It Up, Fuzzball: The Family Guy Trilogy ''(2010) a series of parodies of the original ''Star Wars ''trilogy. In 2008, MacFarlane confirmed that the cast was interested in producing a feature film and that he was working on a story for a film adaptation. A spin-off series, The Cleveland Show, featuring Cleveland Brown, aired from September 27, 2009 to May 19, 2013. "The Simpsons Guy", a crossover episode with ''The Simpsons, aired on September 28, 2014. Family Guy ''is a joint production by Fuzzy Door Productions and 20th Century Fox Television and syndicated by 20th Television. In 2013, ''TV Guide ranked Family Guy ''the ninth Greatest TV Cartoon of All Time. Premise Characters The show revolves around the adventures of the Griffin family, consisting of father Peter Griffin, a bumbling yet well-intentioned blue-collar worker; Lois, a stay-at-home mother and piano teacher who is a member of the wealthy Pewterschmidt family; Meg, their awkward teenage daughter who is constantly ridiculed and ignored by the family; Chris, their teenage son, who is overweight, unintelligent and a younger version of his father in many respects; and Stewie, their diabolical infant son of ambiguous sexual orientation who has adult mannerisms, and uses stereotypical archvillain phrases. Living with their family is their witty, smoking, martini-swilling, sarcastic, English-speaking anthropomorphic dog Brian, though he is still considered a pet in many respects. Recurring characters appear alongside the Griffin family. These include the family's neighbors: sex-crazed airline pilot bachelor Glenn Quagmire; African American deli owner Cleveland Brown and his wife Loretta (later Donna Tubbs); paraplegic police officer Joe Swanson, his wife Bonnie, and their baby daughter Susie; neurotic Jewish pharmacist Mort Goldman, his wife Muriel, and their geeky and annoying son Neil; and elderly child molester John Herbert. TV news anchors Tom Tucker and Diane Simmons (former), Asian reporter Tricia Takanawa, and ''Blaccu-Weather meteorologist Ollie Williams also make frequent appearances. Actors Adam West and James Woods guest star as themselves in various episodes. Setting The primary setting of Family Guy ''is Quahog (/ˈkoʊhɒɡ/ ko-hog or kwo-hog), a fictional district of Providence, Rhode Island that was founded by Peter's ancestor Griffin Peterson. MacFarlane resided in Providence during his time as a student during his time as a as a student at Rhode Island School of Design, and the show contains distinct Rhode Island landmarks similar to real-world locations. MacFarlane often borrows the names of locations and icons such as Pawtucket and Buddy Cianci for use in the show. MacFarlane, in an interview with WNAC-TV, Channel 64 in Providence, stated that the town is modeled after Cranston, Rhode Island. Development MacFarlane initially conceived ''Family Guy ''in 1995 while studying animation at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD). During college, he created his thesis film entitled, ''The Life of Larry, which was submitted by his professor at RISD to Hanna-Barbera. MacFarlane was hired by the company. In 1996, MacFarlane created a sequel to The Life of Larry, ''entitled ''Larry and Steve, ''which featured a middle-aged character named Larry and an intellectual dog, Steve; the short was broadcast in 1997 as one of Cartoon Network's ''World Premiere Toons. '' Executives at Fox saw the ''Larry ''shorts and contracted MacFarlane to create a series, entitled ''Family Guy, ''based on the characters. Fox proposed MacFarlane complete a 15-minute short, and gave him a budget of $50,000. Several aspects of ''Family Guy were inspired by the Larry shorts. ''While working on the series the character of Larry and his dog Steve slowly evolved into Peter and Brian. MacFarlane stated the difference between ''The Life of Larry ''and ''Family Guy ''was that "''Life of Larry was shown primarily in my dorm room and Family Guy was shown after the Super Bowl." After the pilot aired, the series was given the green light. MacFarlane drew inspiration from several sitcoms such as The Simpsons ''and ''All in the Family. Premises were drawn from several 1980s Saturday morning cartoons he watched as a child, such as The Fonz and the Happy Days Gang ''and ''Rubik, the Amazing Cube. The Griffin family first appeared on a demo that MacFarlane pitched to Fox on May 15, 1998. Family Guy ''was originally planned to start out as short movies for the sketch show ''MADtv, but the plan changed because MADtv's budget was not large enough to support animation production. MacFarlane noted that he then wanted to pitch it to Fox, as he thought that that was the place to create a prime-time animation show. Family Guy ''was originally pitched to Fox in the same year as ''King of the Hill, ''but the show was not bought until years later, when ''King of the Hill ''became successful. Fox ordered 13 episodes of ''Family Guy ''to air in midseason after MacFarlane impressed executives with a seven-minute demo. Episodes Production Executive Producers Seth MacFarlane has served as an executive producer during the show's entire history, and also functions as a creative consultant. The first executive producers were David Zuckerman, Lolee Aries, David Pritchard, and Mike Wolf. ''Family Guy ''has had many executive producers in it's history, including Daniel Palladino, Kara Vallow, and Danny Smith. David A. Goodman joined the show as a co-executive producer in season three, and eventually became an executive producer. Alex Borstein, who voices Lois, worked as an executive and supervising producer for the fourth and fifth seasons. A more involved position on the show is the show runner, who acts as head writer and manages the show's production for an entire season. Writing The first team of writers assembled for the show consisted of Chris Sheridan, Danny Smith, Gary Janetti, Ricky Blitt, Neil Goldman (who the character of ''Neil Goldman is named after), Garrett Donovan, Matt Weitzman, and Mike Barker. The writing process of Family Guy generally starts with 14 writers that take turns writing the script; when a script is finished it is given to the rest of the writers to read. These scripts generally include cutaway gags. Various gags are pitched to MacFarlane and the rest of the staff, and those deemed funniest are included in the episode. MacFarlane has explained that normally it takes 10 months to produce an episode because the show uses hand-drawn animation. The show rarely comments on current events for this reason. The show's initial writers had never written for an animated show; and most came from live-action sitcoms. MacFarlane explains that he is a fan of 1930s and 1940s radio programs, particularly the radio thriller anthology "Suspense", which led him to give early episodes ominous titles like "Death Has a Shadow" and "Mind Over Murder." MacFarlane explained that the team dropped the naming convention after individual episodes became hard to identify, and the novelty wore off. For the first few months of production, the writers shared one office, lent to them by the King of the Hill ''production crew. Credited with 18 episodes, Steve Callaghan is the most prolific writer on ''Family Guy ''staff. Many of the writers who have left the show have gone on to create or produce other successful series. Neil Goldman and Garrett Donovan co-wrote 13 episodes for the NBC sitcom ''Scrubs ''during their eight-year run on the show, while also serving as co-producers and working their way up to executive producers. Mike Barker and Matt Weitzman left the show and went on to create the long-running and still ongoing adult animated series ''American Dad! MacFarlane is also the co-creator of American Dad! ''On November 4, 2013, it was announced that Barker had departed ''American Dad! during it's run as well, after 10 seasons of serving as producer and co-showrunner over the series. During the 2007-2008 Writers Guild of America strike, official production of the show halted for most of December 2007 and for various periods afterwards. Fox continued producing episodes without MacFarlane's final approval, which he termed "a colossal dick move" in an interview with Variety. Though MacFarlane refused to work on the show, his contract under Fox required him to contribute to any episodes it would subsequently produce. Production officially resumed after the end of the strike, with regularly airing episodes recommencing on February 17, 2008. According to MacFarlane, in 2009, it costs about $2 to make an episode of Family Guy. '' Early History and Cancellation ''Family Guy ''officially premiered after Fox's broadcast of Super Bowl XXXIII on January 31, 1999, with "Death Has a Shadow." The show debuted to 22 million viewers, and immediately generated controversy regarding it's adult content. The show returned on April 11, 1999, with "I Never Met the Dead Man." ''Family Guy ''garnered descent ratings in Fox's 8:30 pm slot on Sunday, scheduled between ''The Simpsons ''and ''The X-Files. '' At the end of it's first season, the show ranked at #33 in the Nielsen ratings, with 12.8 million households tuning in. The show launched it's second season in a new time slot, Thursday at 9 pm, on September 23, 1999. '' Family Guy ''was pitted against NBC's ''Frasier, and the series' ratings declined sharply. Subsequently, Fox removed Family Guy ''from it's schedule, and began airing episodes irregularly. The show returned on March 7, 2000, at 8:30 pm on Tuesdays, where it was constantly beaten in the ratings by ABC's then-new breakout hit ''Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, coming in at #114 in the Nielsen ratings with 6.32 households tuning in. Fox announced that the show had been canceled in May 2000, at the end of the second season. However, fallowing a last-minute reprieve, on July 24, 2000, Fox ordered 13 additional episodes of Family Guy ''to form a third season. The show returned on November 8, 2001, once again in a tough time slot: Thursday nights at 8:00 pm ET ; this slot brought it into competition with ''Survivor ''and ''Friends (a situation that was later referenced in Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story). During it's second and third seasons, Fox frequently moved the show around to different days and time slots with little or no notice and, consequently, the show's ratings suffered. Upon Fox's annual unveiling of it's 2002 fall line-up on May 15, 2002, ''Family Guy '' was absent. Fox announced that the show was officially canceled shortly thereafter. Cult Success and Revival Fox attempted to sell rights for reruns of the show, but it was difficult to find networks that were interested; Cartoon Network eventually bought the rights, "... basically for free", according to the president of 20th Century Fox Television. ''Family Guy ''premiered in reruns on Adult Swim on April 20, 2003, and immediately became the block's top rated program, dominating late-night viewing in it's time period versus cable